Ashley

Glad to hear that it's not gone for good!

All I'm saying is that if you really want to destroy a lot of cars and do it quickly you're going to need to either gear up for it or deal with it taking longer than you may like. You also don't need to destroy car spawners and leaving them around so you know exactly where your enemies will be spawning is hardly the end of the world. Every time they spawn on the car spawns it'll "telegraph their approximate positions" as well, making them a target. Every time they pull up a new car it telegraphs their exact real-time positions while they drive it up, not to mention the time it takes to do so, by which point the objective has likely moved on to the next stage anyway. I've also never seen this whack-a-mole with car spawners you're describing, but that's anecdotal. Either way, the time it takes to pull a new vehicle is comparable to the time it takes to destroy one. I don't really understand how you can be citing these numbers and still claim it's impossible to be outside the blast zone. You realize that you don't start running away from it at 0m, right? Even being physically pressed up against the side of an Espacio is starting at 2-4m away from the center easily. Start out just a few steps away from the vehicle itself and you're halfway to the edge of the maximum (not even lethal) damage radius already. It's impossible to avoid death to a lot of stuff if you're located anywhere remotely open. I'm comparing 1) the act of being caught out in the open and dying to an enemy with [weapon] and 2) the act of being caught out in the open and dying to an enemy with [remote det]. The time to kill of remote det is many times longer than the time to kill of most ranged weapons if they catch you out in the open. If you want to start adding random qualifiers, circumstances, modifiers, and start making up scenarios then go for it. Every method that you can use to kill an enemy has a scenario where it's more effective and a scenario where it's less effective. It's difficult to compare two things when you begin adding a truckload of additional variables on top. The fact remains that killing someone with remote detonator takes longer, takes more effort, uses up a vehicle, is broadcasted to the enemies well in advance of you being anywhere near them, and is avoidable more times than not. It also takes up a very useful character modification slot, destroys your vehicle regardless of the result, and as a result removes the ability to use your vehicle as a future asset. It's a lot of sacrifice for the potential short-term gain of a kill or two that could be achieved as or more effectively by many other methods. Are there times where it's "impossible" to avoid being blown up by Remote Detonator, given the right circumstance? Yes. Are there times where it's "impossible" to avoid dying to any weapon in the game, given the right circumstance? Also yes.

Isn't it great how much balance and variety we have in grenades, consumables, and weapons? It's almost like you shouldn't expect to be easily blowing up every vehicle you see unless you gear up for it, and if you prioritize things other than hard damage in your loadout then blowing up vehicles should be something that takes some minor time and effort otherwise what's the point? Except you're not just reacting to the sound, you're reacting to the vehicle that shows up on radar the whole time it's driving up to you and that you know is going to explode because the driver has remote det (which you can find out as soon as you get opp), and you can identify the vehicle itself as well because it'll almost certainly have Explosives 3 on it which you can see by mousing over it as soon as it's within LOS. There's a lot of early warning. That's not to mention preemptive measures rather than purely reactionary ones like staying near cover that can break LOS with the explosion and prevent damage even if you're right next to it, destroying the vehicle before it gets to you, or being inside a vehicle that can take the explosion damage, leaving you unhurt when it goes off. Flak jacket is also technically beneficial even though its benefit doesn't nearly come close to competing with CA3 overall so that's kind of a moot point when so few run it. Being caught out in the open with no cover is a death sentence if someone catches you out there regardless of whether they have a rifle or a remote detonator. In fact it's significantly easier to get away from a remote detonator in the open than it is to get away from an HVR if it tags you and you're in the middle of the street or if an NTEC lights you up while you're crossing. Going back to your "explosion radius 12m", that's the maximum range I assume you're talking about and the lethal damage drops off at like 9-10m in that case. Couple with the fact that you start several meters from the explosion center already (which is in the middle of the car), and that you can run opposite the direction it's coming (so that it coasts away from you rather than with you) and you can very easily clear the lethal damage radius and likely even the max damage radius of any vehicle in the game. Again, why is it annoying when it's a death to remote detonator and not annoying when it's a death to anything else when the circumstances are the same? No offense to the victims in your video but standing still next to a remote det car is how you die to them, yes. You could make a montage of killing (not arresting) low-rank silvers with an NL9 and that doesn't mean it's suddenly so strong. Try that "get out, crouch, and shoot while standing still" tactic on some other people and you're going to be looking for a new spawn point pretty quick. That's the point of putting it up there isn't it? Having a single opponent alone on an overpass forces you to do the exact same thing as well. My team would frequently run mobile radar exclusively and I felt that was an advantage overwhelmingly more often than a disadvantage. Leaving alone the "without being able to do anything against it" which is patently false, mobile radar obviously doesn't kill people because that's not what it does. The sole purpose of remote detonator is to either kill people or threaten to kill them, and you can only do it once. I would certainly hope that it does that sole purpose better than a modification that does nothing of the sort. Mobile Radar allows you to very easily kill anyone that comes near it because you know exactly where they are when they don't, and you can do that as many times as you want until the enemy team tries to remove it which uses up their time and their resources rather than yours.

I always seem to have time to do so personally, and having the forethought to check the opposition's loadout before and throughout the mission is another aspect of metagaming in APB that adds some depth and heightens the skill ceiling. There are few games where you get such an insight into your opposition's intentions and capabilities as in APB through the scoreboard. The modification would be useless if it was too easy to never be inconvenienced by it. The purpose of it is to either act as a deterrent to approaching the vehicle or to attempt to eliminate something (like an enemy or their vehicle) through its explosion. Dying to a well-timed Remote Detonator explosion is something I consider no different from dying to a weapon or grenade, and I don't see why some get so frustrated by it and don't get as annoyed when they die to a well-placed Concussion grenade on their vehicle or other means. Also, suicides give demerits and enough of them will have you removed from the mission. Obviously, a slightly reduced score may not be a real deterrent to many players, but there is an upper limit to how many times they can suicide detonate before it kicks them from the game. If you can avoid death once or twice in a suicide rush, which is hardly impossible, that's a big disincentive to them doing it again. I agree that Extra Cargo is a mostly useless modification that should be rethought in terms of PVP, as it's only useful for ramraiders. Mobile Supply Unit has been overshadowed by the prevalence of ammo supply consumables, which is a shame. It could be reworked to resupply quicker than any other means, or potentially remove the ability to resupply grenades from anywhere except Mobile Supply and ammo vendors to cut down on grenade spam and incentivise the use of MSU. Mobile Radar Tower, however, is in my opinion by far the strongest vehicle modification in the game, similar to how Spotter is by far the strongest character modification (far overshadowing Remote Detonator, by the way). You may not feel this way but Mobile Radar and Spotter are huge factors in how many times my teammates and I get accused of wallhacks or cheats in general. Knowing the exact position of your enemy is a force multiplier that makes missions way easier than a potential extra kill or two from Remote Detonator does. Mobile Spawner is definitely a big boon if at least one vehicle on your team has it, but it very quickly hits diminishing returns after that one vehicle. The team is much better served with Radar Towers outnumbering Spawners than vice versa. And, thanks! I never really left, though it's nice to see a new administration that can hopefully right some wrongs and put the game on a good track.

I feel like the Remote Detonator is relatively balanced in that if you know it's there (which you can check as soon as you get opp), it's not too difficult to play around it, and once they use it, their vehicle is obviously no longer available. Vehicles are a big asset in this game and the choice of blowing it up on purpose for potential short-term gain vs the longer-term disadvantage of not having a vehicle is balance enough IMO. You can always proactively detonate a Remote Det vehicle that's being used defensively, or use cover/distance to avoid an offensive one. Mobile Spawner also has the disadvantage of showing up on the map/radar, meaning that an aware enemy will know exactly where you're spawning and be ready for you. Coupled with the delay between car spawns and the "sidegrade" balance of losing the ability to use any of the other blue mods, it's fine as it is. My only addition to the two would be that the Radar Jammer modification should, like suggested above, disable Mobile Spawners in the vicinity (which would generally already be disabled by mere proximity anyway), and prevent Remote Detonator from activating if near the enemy player and/or prevent the vehicle from receiving the detonation request if near the vehicle itself.

Also keep in mind that it's Memorial Day weekend in America. I wouldn't expect them to start working on any tickets until Tuesday.

Ok, I think I figured out why it wasn't working at first. I did "Sign in with GamersFirst" initially which automatically signs you into the forums if you're logged into the main G1 portal already. I had to sign out of the forums, sign out of the main G1 portal, then sign in directly from the forums and manually tick the box instead of first signing into the main portal and then "Sign in with GamersFirst" on the forums. The automatic login feature likely defaults to a standard login regardless of whether "Anonymous Login" was checked beforehand.

If you check the "Anonymous Login" option when signing in it says it'll hide your online status; however, when browsing a thread your username will still appear in the "recently browsing" section at the bottom. I've verified that it appears there for other users as well, not just yourself, and is not visible to guests. Is this the intended behavior of the "Anonymous Login" option?